Transcript
WEBVTT
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Folks gathered around and welcome back to the Asian athletes podcast.
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This is your host.
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I'll speak to you from sunny San Francisco, California.
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Bringing you epic tales of age, defying limit pushing adventurers.
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Doing remarkable things in the great outdoors.
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The anticipation of today's recording.
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Give me goosebumps.
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I was reliving my own surfing beginnings as I prepared and met with Nature.
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Who at 60 was the oldest two w at Mavericks, one of the biggest and most data fighting big waves worldwide.
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While hat has no desire or expertise to surf big waves, just like Lionel.
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I did learn to serve in the cold waters around the San Francisco bay area.
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He just took it so much further.
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Most of the best surfers around learn surfing as kids.
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Just like the disciplines of gymnastics.
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Or say ballet surfing rewards.
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Early learning.
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So it is really astonishing that he did not.
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Start surfing.
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Until his fifties.
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Less than a decade ago.
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Lionel is a true ageless athlete.
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We will learn.
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From his beginnings as a competitive decathlete.
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And as yet, To participating in the world, triathlon championships.
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To riding in the tour de France to completing.
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Ultra endurance mountain biking races.
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For every decade of his life, since his twenties.
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He has set a monumental goal and then gone out and achieved it.
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Unbelievably, he did all of this while working as an investment banker.
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In wall street, not the cushiest of careers to allow for such explorations.
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In the outdoors.
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I absolutely loved this conversation and hope you will as well.
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I really appreciate you tuning in France.
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I would really love it.
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If you would leave a rating and a review in your podcast app.
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It will only take a minute.
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It really helps.
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Others discover.
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And learn from.
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these Asia's athletes.
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Hi Lionel, great to have you on Ageless Athlete.
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you tell us where are you, where you're from, and what did you have for breakfast today?
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Well, hi, and thanks for having me.
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uh, what I had for breakfast, I had, I had for breakfast, what I have every single day.
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I have a Crispix cereal with brand buds and a sliced banana and fresh raspberries and two cups of coffee and one glass of orange juice.
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And I have that same thing every single day.
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And when I travel, I bring, I bring brand buds with me.
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get whatever the local cereal is, but I always try and I always try and keep my eating very, very consistent no matter where I am.
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Traditions are great and being able to enjoy one's breakfast regardless.
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you eat before your morning surf or after?
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Always before.
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Ah,
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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I know a lot of people don't like, like surfing on a, on a full stomach.
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I think it's cause I, you know, did cycling for such a long time and, and.
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And was, you know, very tuned into making sure that I was fueled properly.
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So I didn't balk.
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And, you know, when, when you're out surfing, you know, I'm, I'm normally out there for, you know, at least an hour and sometimes as long as three hours.
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You know, you, you've got no access to water typically when you're out there.
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So I, I just always make sure that I'm properly fueled before I go out.
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Super.
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We will hopefully get time to dive a bit into your nutrition practices.
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But again, I'm really excited to have you on the show.
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I feel this is going to be a very enlightening episode for me being a local Bay Area surfer myself.
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the chance to learn from your, from, from your background and how you managed to, uh, take your, uh, learnings and go and surf, uh, Mavericks.
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Let's jump right in.
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Can you paint a picture Lionel of what a wave like Mavericks actually looks like?
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looks like up close and then, yeah.
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How does it compare to the usual, uh, beach breaks an average person might be more familiar with?
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it's way bigger than you think it is.
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I think the first time I was out there, Mavericks typically doesn't break unless it's about a 20 foot face.
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what I've learned over the last couple of years is that it, it takes some combination of, swell size and period to break.
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that is greater than 20.
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It, it feels really big.
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compared to anything else, even the biggest, days at Ocean Beach.
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You can get a 20 foot face at Ocean Beach for sure.
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but for some reason Mavericks just feels bigger and more powerful and, just a lot more energy in, in, in terms of how, how it breaks.
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And, and it's such a, Wedge, um, of water.
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you know, the reef is down, I think around 20, 22 feet, something like that.
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And so, takes quite a, quite a swell before we'll, we'll start, we'll start to break, but like, like Jaws and like Nazare, the way the, uh, Topography underneath the ocean works with a canyon coming into a, reef.
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it allows Mavericks to get very, very big without closing out.
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in my experience and when it's huge, like it was at Christmas time this year, and you can only tow it, you know, when they were towing it Um, you know, when it was probably 50 feet face size, the, the, the biggest thing I, you know, and I've said this to everybody, the biggest thing that impacts you when you first go out there, certainly when, when I first went out there.
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Before I even surfed it, I just went out on a, on a jet ski and sat there and watched, is the sound it makes when it breaks the sound is huge and, and it's indescribable.
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And, and it's, it's, it's scary.
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The sound is scary.
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Um, so that, that would be the thing.
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That I would say that, that, you know, anybody that I, that, that I know that's gone out there for the first time, everybody's impacted by the sound it makes when it breaks
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Mostly my.
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recounts, or let's say my, um, understanding of the wave is from the words of, uh, pro surfers talking about the wave in videos.
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And they sound humbled by that same staggering scale of both the size and the sound.
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So hearing it from somebody who is, let's say, not quite a pro yet is, uh, is, is uniquely insightful.
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and never will be a problem, by the way.
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Let me ask this question.
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I have paddle out at ocean beach, which is our local beach in San Francisco, which can also be fairly scary and kind of intense, obviously.
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not on the biggest days.
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Maybe my biggest days out there would be like a double overhead day.
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Some ways, maybe a little bit bigger and just those days compared to, let's say a shoulder height day can be intense.
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I'm guessing you must also have paddled out at OB on those bigger days.
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Can you describe.
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Even that difference, uh, Lionel, which is surfing ocean beach at like a double overhead day, like a bigger day versus being at Mavericks on a 20 foot or greater day.
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so this may surprise you, but there's a group of us that are in our sixties that surf Mavericks is probably six or seven guys, that they're all in their sixties that surf Mavericks and, and I'm the noobie in that group.
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most of those guys have surfed it for, you know, 30 plus years.
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and, uh, you know, Christie Davis who surfed it, for probably 35 years, um, surfed it at age 70 last year.
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I think he's probably the oldest guy to ever surf Mavericks.
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and as soon as he did it, he, he moved up to Humboldt and he said he'd never surf Mavericks again, uh, after he did it.
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but that group of guys would all tell you.
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That they would rather surf Mavericks than surf Ocean Beach on a big day.
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cause as you know, paddling out, to get to the outside break at Ocean Beach on a big day, unless the period's really long and you've got a lot of time between sets.
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Is one of the hardest things to do in surfing in the world, I think, and, and I, and I, you know, had, had the pleasure of having had the opportunity to serve a lot of the North Shore and sort of big sunset and, and surf, and, there are very few places in the world that are as hairy to get out.
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As as Ocean Beach you know, what's it, I mean, the paddle out to Mavericks is a long paddle and, you know, it takes usually 30, 30, 35 minutes, something like that to get out if you're going the long way, or if you're going the short way, it takes about 20 minutes, but other than being a long paddle, it's not particularly hard to get out there, and then I would say the biggest, Difference is Mavericks is is because it's a point break is way more organized than the notion beaches.
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I think that the consequences that at Ocean Beach can be, probably as severe as Mavericks.
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And I mean, you got a lot more water moving around and in a lot different ways.
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And, and even and even at at sunset on a big day, I've had, I had my worst hold down I've ever had anywhere at Sunset, um, not at Mavericks and, and I've fallen plenty at Mavericks.
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I mean, I've, I've had, I probably, I think I've probably done 25 sessions at Mavericks over the last three years.
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And.
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without a doubt, the worst hold down I ever had was at Sunset Beach.
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I had a two way fold down at Sunset Beach and I wasn't wearing my Patagonia vest and I was, yeah, that was gnarly.
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And I've been, you know, that includes, I like, I've been, I've been washed through, through the boneyard at Mavericks on, on a big day.
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Um, and, and the worst, the worst experience that I had was it was at sunset for sure.
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And, and I, and I think that the, you know, Ocean Beach, Sometimes on big days, I paddle out at ocean beach and I see, I see people out there and not that I'm anyone to talk cause I'm, I'm still, you know, a relatively new surfer, but, um, but I see some people that have paddled out or try to paddle out on big days at ocean beach and you just shake their head cause they shouldn't be there.
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They shouldn't be doing what they're, you know, and, and, and as, as I'm sure, you know, we have, Usually one to two drownings a year at Ocean Beach and, and typically it's a surfer and it's somebody who's, you know, who's just underestimated the power of the ocean out there.
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Um, you know, a big day at Ocean Beach, there's a lot of water moving around and a lot of rip tides going every which way.
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And it's, you know.
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I don't need to tell you.
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You're, you're, you're well familiar with it.
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It, it, it can be, it, it can be scary for sure,
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Thanks for, uh, describing the, uh, let's see the differences between surfing at other places.
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like Ocean Beach and also at Mavericks and uh, despite whatever, you know, you have said about Mavericks perhaps being more approachable in some ways, you have not convinced me yet to join you on your, on your next session at, at, Mavericks.
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Yeah, I would love to actually go deeper into the day when you made your debut as the, um, older surfer to, uh, paddle out at Mavericks.
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Take us through how you decided what was the right day and time to paddle out on, and then also a little bit into your pre surf ritual.
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Food, gear checks.
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Maybe any mental prep that happened that day.
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Maybe you meditated and then, uh, geared up and got ready to paddle out, would love for you to take us through that.
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Sure.
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and firstly, just, just to clarify, so, I, I believe, and, and I've talked to everybody that, that has surfed Mavericks for a long time, that I was the oldest person to surf Mavericks for the first time.
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So I was, I was 59 and a half, when I first caught a, a successful wave at Mavericks.
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And, that was after starting, I, I started surfing, um, when I was about 53 and, and I decided to, to surf Mavericks in my 60th year because, um, in my life, I've always, on, on, on my big decade birthdays, I've always decided to do something.
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a big physical challenge.
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And, um, and previously it had been primarily in the cycling realm.
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for my, uh, 50th birthday, I, rode Leadville, um, which, which is the highest mountain bike race in the world, 103 miles, all above 10, 000 feet.
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and then when I was 40, I did seven straight days of the Tour de France.
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And when I was 30, I competed in the world triathlon championships.
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and then prior to that, I was, a, uh, uh, decathlete and, and then also play football in college.
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And, so I've always chosen to do on big decade birthdays, a physical challenge, and I'd been fascinated with Mavericks before I started surfing, actually.
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I used to go down and when I first moved to San Francisco, I'd go down and watch the competitions.
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And I, I, I just, for some reason, it, it got into my imagination, um, as something amazing.
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And, so I decided to do it and I hired a coach, a woman named Bianca Valenti, who I'm sure you, if you don't know her, you've seen Bianca, uh, around ocean beach and she's, she's kind of queen of ocean beach and she's queen of Mavericks.
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I asked her whether she would, um, would coach me after, a long interview, she finally decided that she, that she would, she would agree to coach me.
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And so, so she and I started working, together in, uh, March of 2021.
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and she made me do all kinds of things.
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We did, you know, two, uh, two day breath hold coaching sessions.
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And we did a paddle from, from Cronkite to Sausalito, nine mile paddle.
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And we did, all kinds of training at Ocean Beach.
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And on bigger days and then, um, down at Scott's Creek on bigger days.
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And, and then, and then also down at, at, uh, steamer lane on, on big days, all, all with the goal of preparing to, to, to be able to serve Mavericks.
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And we went out and did, whole bunch of, of, uh, safety stuff, jet ski safety stuff, we did, a two day safety summit, Maverick safety summit, um, with all the, all the regular guys.
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so I put about, you know, before, before I actually paddled out for the very first time with the intention of trying to surf Mavericks, which would have been in November of, um, 2021, I'd done a lot of work and, you know, I spent the entire summer, up at my, my summer home in Canada, prone paddling, you know, paddling a couple of miles a day, every day.
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And, when I actually went out to try and surf Mavericks and I, I did probably five sessions where I attempted to catch waves and fell and wasn't successful.
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and I, and I would say that, and I've said this to a number of people who are surfing Mavericks for the first time.
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The best thing you can do is fall.
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The earlier you fall, the more you realize, okay, this is what I'm in for.
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and you can kind of take the, the worry of what's going to happen.
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And, and when I fell the first time, you know, I had a, you know, decently long hold down.
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I was very, very confident in my ability to hold my breath.
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I mean, in my, In the breath hold work we did, I got, I got up to four minutes, holding my breath on static lying face down in the pool.
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and what they say is that if you can, you know, hold your breath for, for four minutes, then active, you, you can probably do half.
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and, you know, in the longest hold down, you know, if you had a three wave hold down at Mavericks even if it was on a 20 second period day, the longest you're going to be underwater is a minute.
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Which is a tremendously long time.
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Don't get me wrong.
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Particularly when you're getting thrashed around and you're, you get pushed down 20 feet and you're underwater and everything.
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And you don't know which way is up and it's black and everything.
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But, but if, if you've done the work and you know that you can hold your breath for, for four minutes in a static position.
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you can probably hold your breath for two minutes in an active position.
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even if your lungs are screaming when you're at a minute.
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That's it.
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You still got some time.
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You're not going to black out.
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You're good.
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You know, you're, you're, you know, so, so you've got time.
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The longest hold down, I think I probably have ever had, which was, which was when I was at, sunset is like maybe 30, 30, 32 seconds.
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I count, they tell you not to count, but I always count.
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I count Tacomas.
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cause I've got, little friend of mine, Aaron Brooks, who's a, uh, She's, she's an amazing surfer.
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and, she told me that the kids in Hawaii all count Tacomas.
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They, they practice when they're driving around.
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And, you know, when, when I was a kid, we used to play Volkswagen.
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You used to count count Volkswagen Beals when you're driving on a long drive.
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And, and they, they do a variation of that game where they, The first Tacoma they see, they hold their breath, and they have to count 10 Tacomas before they can take another breath.
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But there's Tacomas all over the place in Hawaii, so, you know, you could be holding your breath for 15 seconds, or you could be holding your breath for a minute, but, you know, probably not longer than a minute.
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So, anyway, I count Tacomas whenever I fall.
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and I know that if, you know, if I'm at 20 Tacomas, I've got a good 30 or 40 more Tacomas in me before I got any issues.
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it's a way to help me stay very calm.
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you know, one of the sayings in big wave surfing is panic equals death.
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And so it's really important, no matter what's happening, to stay calm and not panic.
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and so all of that's background to, you know, when I first paddled out there and first tried to catch, um, a wave there, I fell, I, I fell probably on the first six waves that I tried to catch and had, you know, varying degrees of hold downs and because of the preparation I'd done.
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I was fine and I've actually never pulled my my CO2 cartridge at Mavericks.
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I, I've been under for a long time, but I've never felt the need to, to pull the, to pull the cartridge, uh, to get to the top.
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that, that was kind of my, my, first experience that Bianca was very, um, strict with me and 10 still is, um, some, sometimes.
00:20:48.632 --> 00:20:51.392
I'll text her and say, you know, what do you think about tomorrow?
00:20:51.392 --> 00:20:53.701
And, and she'll go, yeah, tomorrow's not a Lionel day.
00:20:54.721 --> 00:20:55.692
Don't go out tomorrow.
00:20:56.152 --> 00:21:03.416
but, you know, the first, You know, five or six times we went out, it was on, you know, smaller, smaller side of Mavericks.
00:21:03.416 --> 00:21:06.406
So, you know, maybe, maybe 20 feet, not more than 25 feet.
00:21:06.406 --> 00:21:09.438
And, and the wind conditions were, were pretty favorable.
00:21:10.377 --> 00:21:14.587
the day that I caught, actually caught my first wave and rode it right down to the channel.
00:21:15.327 --> 00:21:17.178
I think there were only six or seven of us out there.
00:21:17.355 --> 00:21:18.664
It wasn't a huge day.
00:21:19.355 --> 00:21:20.305
it was a beautiful day.
00:21:20.305 --> 00:21:30.049
It was really, really glassy and, Grant Washburn was out there and Grant, as you may or may not know, is, is, you know, kind of the mayor of Mavericks these days.
00:21:30.201 --> 00:21:32.432
He kind of took over Jeff Clark's spot.
00:21:32.461 --> 00:21:37.622
Um, and, and I think Grant's probably surfed Mavericks more than anybody ever in the history.
00:21:37.994 --> 00:21:44.035
because he surfs it every time it breaks and, and he's always out there and he's an amazing human.
00:21:44.419 --> 00:22:08.625
and I'm considering myself to be extraordinarily lucky that, uh, he and I become friends and, and, uh, and he, uh, He's been amazingly helpful to me, you know, over the last couple of years as I've been surfing it and always full of suggestions and always willing to ask, answer any question you ask him and he's just, he's just a wonderful human and I didn't really know him that well.
00:22:08.625 --> 00:22:10.144
I'd met him once or twice.
00:22:10.354 --> 00:22:16.054
Um, he had done a coffee table book on Mavericks back in the 90s, and I, and I bought it.
00:22:16.114 --> 00:22:17.894
I found a copy of it.
00:22:18.134 --> 00:22:26.391
It's out of print, but I found a copy of it, we, Bianca and I paddled out that day, which was in, uh, February of 2010.
00:22:27.590 --> 00:22:28.201
22.
00:22:28.858 --> 00:22:33.128
Grant was out there and we were sitting around, uh, the sets were very far apart.
00:22:33.588 --> 00:22:39.950
And, um, and I said to him, you know, Grant, I got this coffee table book that you, created.
00:22:40.020 --> 00:22:44.201
and when I catch my first wave of Mavericks, I'm going to get you to sign it for me.
00:22:44.892 --> 00:22:47.571
And he looked at me and he laughed and he said, I hope you have it in the car.
00:22:47.571 --> 00:22:49.311
Cause you're going to catch your first wave today.
00:22:49.892 --> 00:22:56.327
And I said, I said, I, I said, I don't, I don't, but, you know, but I'd love to catch my first wave today.
00:22:56.327 --> 00:23:00.005
And he said, okay, well, just stick with me and I'll, and I'll, I'll get you into it.
00:23:00.005 --> 00:23:01.525
And Christy Davis was out there.
00:23:01.585 --> 00:23:04.474
Um, and Christy was 69 at that time.
00:23:04.934 --> 00:23:10.184
Uh, and there were, there were four or five other guys and Bianca was the only woman as she often is.
00:23:11.180 --> 00:23:14.970
anyway, all of a sudden Grant said, here comes a set.
00:23:14.970 --> 00:23:17.420
And I look out on the horizon, I don't see anything.
00:23:18.019 --> 00:23:18.369
And.
00:23:19.190 --> 00:23:29.490
And, but sure enough, about a minute later set comes and he says, I'm going to take the first wave and you take the second wave.
00:23:29.857 --> 00:23:32.857
and he said, just look where I take off and just take off a little bit inside me.
00:23:33.048 --> 00:23:39.439
And, uh, anyway, the wave came, he, he took off, he catches, he catches it, he almost never falls.
00:23:39.888 --> 00:23:44.038
So he's, he's not a good barometer of what it can be like.
00:23:44.358 --> 00:23:49.378
Uh, anyway, I just, on the next wave, I turned and paddled and caught it and got to my feet.
00:23:49.959 --> 00:23:53.548
And, uh, the next thing I know I'm, I'm ripping down the face on the wave.
